In Response to the Iowa Supreme Court Decision

[Barry]

The political question of gay marriage isn't about who wants to get married and who doesn't, who can get married and who can't. It's about who is married and who isn't.
Every gay couple who wants to get married already is. And they know it. They just want eveyone else to know it, too. They want everyone else to recognize it. And that's what the gay marriage political question is all about---the recognition by society of a bond that already exists. It's about collective will as opposed to or in alignment with individual will.
What happens when society collectively recognizes the individual will to bond with another in whatever form that bond may take?
Does society break down?
Or does society build up?

This is the question.

Anyone got the answer?

Peace,
Barry

[stilltrucking]

I got no answer, only an opinion.

I would say build up.

[Barry]

As a straight married male I say build up, too. Because what breakdown is currently taking place due to all the "married" gay people already living in society, even if society does not recognize their bond as "marriage"?
None, in my opinion.

Peace,
Barry

[jimboloco]

the next level is to say \celebrate diversity
get over paranoia
and so forth

society will progress towards a more enlightened humanism

[mtmynd]

They just want eveyone else to know it, too. They want everyone else to recognize it.

Gays would also like the legal acceptance so they can behave with the same respectability we straight folks have. Granted legalizing G/L marriage is not the golden egg but a very large step forward in the human rights of this group... an historical change for we humans to come to grips with the reality.

IMHO, G/L marriages can only help our society grow in a more positive direction.

[jimboloco]

i agree
my worklady friend nolita has a woman life partner
open to their families
she is respected and befriended by all the other ladies

but they are not legally married, have no legal rights as a couple
so no they are NOT married
which is a legal arrangement
beyond the socially sanctioned matrimony between a horney jerkoff man and a hardup lonely woman who may never really connect, depending on how far their sexual and social longing can carry them into each other


but it goes to show
conservative society is aghast at the future
an open book for love and marraige
and so they are being dragged kicking and screaming into the future

had to give a talking to one younger dude
like way younger, like 45 or so
he is relatively new to our unit
and he had the habit of cracking gay jokes
and making comments about this or that doctor being "wavy" or gay
and this gay lady friend of mine who confides in me said that she was offended
by these remarks

so i took the lad aside and talked with him
reminded him about how when we were young we heard "colored" jokes, thought they were harmless and funny, never understanding that they were perpetuating rascism
and that these cutsie so-called gay jokes were actually as offensive as racism
like told him that when we come here into work, we do not care if a doctor is straight or gay, nor anyone else

the black lady secretary heard me and affirmed this
plus the gay doctore we work with are very decent people,, great docs
and frankly, are better when they know that they are respected for their professionalism

so the big dude has slacked off
and my next lecture went to my own brother
who sent me a joke

when the two lesbians in my neighborhood asked me what i wanted for xmax and i waid "i wanna watch," i wasn't talking about the rolex i got!

so i told him about nolita and
so this xmas i will send him a xmas wish list
as he is living with a lady
and will return the joke "i wanna watch"
and see how he feels then

it's about rascism, prejudice, intolerance, being small minded and afraid of god's miracles, all different windows into the wonder of life

[Barry]

but they are not legally married, have no legal rights as a couple
so no they are NOT married
which is a legal arrangement

bold font mine

Exactly my point, jimbo. But they are married in the eyes of God, in their own eyes, if not the eyes of society. They are living as married, they just don't have the legal recognition of such. We hear about how a lesbian can't make decisions about her partner who's dying in the hospital because the dying woman's mother never approved of the relationship. Legal gay marriage is supposed to take care of this. But this sort of thing happens even in legal het marriages all the time. We forget this in all the politicization surrounding the issue. How is it worked out in het marriages? Somehow, is the only answer. As I've no doubt it is in the reality of gay marriages also. We just don't hear about it because it doesn't make good copy.

It's not about tolerance as opposed to intolerance. It's about depoliticization of non-political issues.

People love. When they love, they choose to live together, share their lives. They marry. Whether society recognizes this or not is not the point. Gays should do what they do, what they wish. They should marry, whether it's "legal" or not. As they now do. Society will come along eventually in the long run. As it always does. Even if grumblingly.

Peace,
Barry

[jimboloco]

one toke over the line
society will follow
in fits and starts